Five Britons among Pakistan church blast injured

Two attackers hurled grenades into a Protestant church filled with Sunday worshippers in a diplomatic enclave, killing five people including two Americans and wounding about 45, including five Britons.

Two attackers hurled grenades into a Protestant church filled with Sunday worshippers in a diplomatic enclave, killing five people including two Americans and wounding about 45, including five Britons.

Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf condemned the attack as a "ghastly act of terrorism."

US President George Bush also called it a terrorist attack and pledged to work with the Pakistani government to find those responsible and bring them to justice. In a statement, he condemned the "acts of murder that cannot be tolerated by any person of conscience nor justified by any cause."

It was the second attack against Christians in Pakistan since the September 11 terror attacks in the United States, which prompted Pakistan to abandon support for the Afghan Taliban and instead back the US-led coalition against terrorism.

After today's attack, dozens of police and soldiers surrounded the Protestant International Church located in a heavily guarded diplomatic enclave about half a mile away from the US Embassy. Ambulances rushed to the scene and rescuers scrambled to help the injured.

The US Embassy in Islamabad identified the dead Americans as Barbara Green and her daughter Kristen Wormsley, a senior at the American School in Islamabad. Green and her husband, Milton Green, worked at the embassy - she in administration and he in the computer division.

The others killed included one Afghan, one Pakistani and one of unknown nationality, the Pakistani government news agency said.

Among the injured were five Britons, 12 Pakistanis, 10 Americans, five Iranians, one Iraqi, one Ethiopian and one German, police and the British High Commission said. The government said the injured also included Afghans, Swiss, Australians and Canadians. Six or seven were in serious condition, District Judge Tariq Mehmood Khan said.

Witnesses said the attackers entered the back of the church during the sermon and began hurling grenades at the congregation of about 70.

Three of the grenades exploded and the attackers eluded security guards at the scene, police said.

"I saw two men come into the back of the church into the main sanctuary and threw what looked like hand grenades," said Cindy Jess, an American.

Mark Robinson, who was being treated at the clinic for a minor leg injury, said, "There was total pandemonium."

Elisabeth Mundhenk, 54, of Hamburg, Germany, said she took refuge under a piano when the first explosion rocked the church but still suffered shrapnel wounds in the leg.

"There was blood, blood, blood," she said while awaiting treatment at the hospital. "It was horrific. There was a horrible smell and we could barely breathe."

Although no group claimed responsibility, suspicion fell on Islamic militants angered by Musharraf's crackdown on Islamic extremism begun in January.

"It's a highly deplorable attempt to spoil our relations with foreign countries. Choosing this place is meant to embarrass the government," Pakistani Law Minister Khalid Ranjha said.

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw called the attack a "serious outrage, particularly because it took place within what we thought was the well-protected diplomatic enclave."

"This is part of a continuing effort by dissident extremist terrorists to try to destabilise President Musharraf's government and the support which he enjoys from around the world, including the Western nations," Straw the told BBC.

Sectarian violence has been increasing in Pakistan, but most attacks have targeted Pakistan's Shiite Muslim minority. Extremists from the majority Sunni Muslim community have been blamed.

Despite the increase in sectarian violence, Ranjha said officials believed the church was well-protected. Such attacks in the Pakistani capital, where security is higher than elsewhere in the country, are relatively infrequent.

"The attack shows that those who carried it out were committed people," Ranjha said.

The last major violent incident directed at Christians occurred on October 28 when gunmen entered a church in the Punjab province town of Behawalpur and killed 15 worshippers and a Muslim guard.

Religious tension had been expected to rise with the start this weekend of the Islamic month of Moharram, marking the beginning of the Muslim year.

In January, Musharraf banned five Islamic extremist groups and announced measures extending control over religious schools considered a breeding ground for terrorism.